


Brothers

by consideritalljoy



Series: Attachment [1]
Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Legends: Outbound Flight - Timothy Zahn, Star Wars: Thrawn - Timothy Zahn
Genre: Canon Compliant, Emotional Hurt, Feels, Gen, spoilers for outbound flight, the death isn't shown, thrass as older sibling, thrawn as a child
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-29
Updated: 2017-07-29
Packaged: 2018-12-08 16:14:17
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,489
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11650158
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/consideritalljoy/pseuds/consideritalljoy
Summary: Thrass comforts Thrawn through their parents' deaths, but who comforts Thrawn through Thrass's?





	Brothers

“What happens to me and my brother now?”

“You will be put into foster care.”

“Are you going to split us up?”

“No, child. I have found someone who will take you both.” 

“I’ll take care of him.”

“I know you will.” 

—

Thrawn had no idea what was happening. All he knew was that one day, everything was normal, and the next, authorities were showing up saying his parents were both dead and he and Thrass had to come with them. Now his life seemed like a long stretch of waiting times in different rooms, all of which were completely foreign to him. 

He pressed his back against the corner farthest from the door and wrapped his arms around his legs, burying his face in his knees. Thrass was pacing in circles. _If Thrass is pacing, he isn’t okay. Thrass only paces when things aren’t okay._

“Thrass?” he asked, not bothering to raise his head up. 

Thrass abruptly stopped pacing and stood rigidly still. “Yes, Thrawn?” 

Thrawn gulped. It was time to actually say what he’d been thinking all this time. But if he couldn’t ask Thrass, who could he? “Is it our fault Mom and Dad are dead? Are we being punished?” His voice was muffled by his legs, but he still didn’t raise his head at all. 

Thrass moved closer to him and dropped to the floor, pressing his back against the wall the same way Thrawn had. His left arm snaked around Thrawn’s neck and his right one wrapped around his chest by his shoulders. Thrawn wiggled around a bit until he was firmly sitting on top of Thrass, whose arms were now almost completely encasing him. _Safe._

“It’s not our fault,” Thrass said in his ear. “You’re going to be okay. I’m going to get us through this somehow. I promise. I couldn’t protect them, but I’m not going to let anything stop me from protecting you.” His hold on Thrawn got tighter. Thrawn turned around enough to wrap his arms around Thrass as well. 

Thrass kept talking. _His voice is all choked up, like his throat is tight._ “We’re all each other has now, so you have to promise not to leave me, and I promise to never leave you, okay?”

Clinging tighter, Thrawn solemnly nodded his head against Thrass’s chest. “I promise.” 

—

Thrass should have been back from ridding Chiss space of Outbound Flight days ago. Thrawn paced in his quarters. He hadn’t slept well over the last few days. He doubted he would until Thrass returned, for several reasons.

For one, the Ruling Families were clamoring to have him court-martialled, at the very least. What with how angry some of them were, Thrawn was not overlooking the possibility of exile. Ar’alani had already done what she could, but they needed nothing less than a political miracle. They needed Thrass. 

And for another, the mission really shouldn’t take as long as it seemingly was. The Chiss Defense Fleet was tracking Outbound Flight trying to figure out where it went. If they found it, the whole thing would have been in vain, and if they didn’t, Thrass’s only way back was himself. If he needed help, no one could come. 

“Commander Mitth’raw’nuruodo, by order of the Ascendency, I command you to open this door,” came a voice from the other side. Ar’alani. _Her tone is rigid, as befits her rank, but is also tight, as though she were unhappy with the words being said._

Thrawn obeyed, and found Ar’alani flanked by two uniformed Chiss. They wore restrainer cuffs on their belts. _Their muscles, including those of their faces, are stiff. They are deeply unhappy and yet are resolved in their actions._

“Has my brother returned?” he asked, hiding his tentativeness with curiosity. 

Ar’alani’s eyes flashed in sympathy for only a moment before glazing over again in professionalism. “I’m afraid not, Commander. The remains of Outbound Flight were traced to the end of Chiss space, but not beyond. As far as our scans can detect, the ship was doomed. Syndic Mitth'ras'safis of the Eighth Ruling Family has been pronounced dead.”

As Ar’alani spoke, Thrawn’s concern grew. With the delivery of the final words, his body went numb. Suddenly weak, Thrawn reached with his left hand to grasp the frame of the door for support. “Is there no chance of recovering him?” he asked, though he knew full well the hope was futile. 

“All possible avenues for his recovery as well as the recovery of Outbound Flight have been attempted. The fleet, and your brother, are gone.” _She pauses, but does not finish. She has not yet made known her full purpose._

Thrawn focused on holding his posture steady and continuing to breath normally. Ar’alani’s next words hardly needed to be spoken; he knew well enough what they would be. 

He was right. “As it is your actions which lead to the destruction and loss of Outbound Flight as well as Syndic Mitth’ras’safis’s death, you are being detained on the charge of high treason.”

Numb, Thrawn allowed himself to be handcuffed, and numb, he allowed himself to be placed in a holding cell. The cuffs were removed. “I am sorry for your loss,” Ar’alani said softly, and shut the door. 

Thrawn was alone, in a way he never had been before. 

Thrass was dead, and with him, the last of Thrawn’s blood family. With him, Thrawn’s career. With him, quite possibly, Thrawn’s homeworld. 

Left alone in a foreign room after callously being told devastating news felt familiar, with one notable exception. The last time, Thrass had been there too. 

Could it be his fault? 

_I will do whatever necessary to protect those who depend on me._ That, Thrawn had done—so had Thrass. Thrawn sat on the bench at the far end of the small room, drew his arms closer to his core, and dropped his head into his hands. 

It was a calculated risk. It was the only moral course of action. Thrawn couldn’t have changed his actions without abandoning his honor and integrity both as a commander and as a person. The same went for Thrass. In the end, they’d each made much the same choice. 

Only, it had killed Thrass. Thrawn was still very much alive. He suspected, to the chagrin of the Ascendency. Without Thrass there to pull strings as he had for Thrawn on several other occasions, there would be no diverting the Ascendency’s wrath. 

What was it about his values that left him at such odds with the world around him?

Thrawn didn’t have to think long. Preemptive strikes. The trouble was that Thrawn actually did agree with the rule against preemptive strikes—to a point. To the Ascendency, any action was preemptive unless the enemy physically fired on Chiss property. 

By then, it was often too late to mount an effective defense. It was always too late to save the property or people fired upon first. 

_I will do whatever necessary to protect those who depend on me._ Why did the Ascendency not see that Thrawn’s objective was only ever Chiss wellbeing? When all logic pointed to an enemy taking action against those under him, was he meant to turn a blind eye? Sacrifice lives for the sake of a tradition? 

If the Ascendency found that defense of lives constituted treason, Thrawn was a traitor. That was clear. They were unlikely to change their views, and in Thrass’s absence, Thrawn was unlikely to be pardoned or cleared.

All logic pointed to a single conclusion: Thrawn would be found guilty of high treason against the organization he had dedicated his life to serve, and once that happened, he would be exiled. 

He would have expected that realization to hit him harder. Instead, he merely went numb again. 

But then, Thrass was dead. What would he really be leaving? 

Only his homeworld. Only his access to anyone who looked anything like him. Only everything he had ever known. 

For a moment, Thrawn regretted not leaving with Car’das when he had the chance. The likelihood of ever running into him again was low. But then, at the time, he had assumed Thrass was still coming back to him. 

The likelihood of the Ascendency leaving him on a planet with inhabitants at all was low. Was his fate really to be left abandoned on a strange, uninhabited planet alone in the knowledge that his actions had killed his only family? 

Thrass’s choice was his own. 

Thrawn had still encouraged it. Perhaps it was his fault in part. Perhaps he deserved the punishment for it. 

Perhaps he didn’t mind exile after all. Thrass was gone, Car’das was gone, and with them, the only people Thrawn had truly believed could possibly have been considered his friends. 

If his actions, logical and moral as they may be, caused only hardship and death for those he called friends, perhaps he shouldn’t have any. 

Perhaps exile was best.

**Author's Note:**

> ...And then, however many years later, Eli walks on the scene. Just a small feels trip I thought up the other morning and wrote down.
> 
> Edit: [**Friends**](http://archiveofourown.org/works/11692443) exists now, and is a kind-of sequel.


End file.
